No. States like Sweden have been protected by the United States since 1941.
Sweden are officially neutral. Thus, your argument would be better if you named Norway or Denmark.
My country has been protected by the US since 1941. While I have deep gratitude to the men who took great personal risk (many of whom died) in WWII, I doubt that the protection offered by their kids and grandkids came at zero cost or was due to kindness. Rather, the US (for large periods) seems to have seen foreign policy as an investment where they hope to get nice returns.
Don't get me wrong, H, when I was an aviation cadet there were Swedes training with me who were quite willing to fly and fight, but the economic burden has been borne by the U.S. for a long, long time. Now that we've become an almost wholly state-run society It looks to me as if we've pretty much reached the end of that rope. We pretend we're only 18 trillion in debt, but when you count the commitments for things like social security, medicare, medicaid, and, basically cradle-to-grave coverage, it's a hell of a lot more than that. I don't think we can keep it up.
The US spends 2x more on health care than Sweden. Yet Swedes have better health than you guys. I am an engineer, not an economist but such apparent differences makes me want to pick the systems apart and figure out what makes them tick. Does this spark any curiosity at all, or are you guys intrinsically and forever polarized on the left vs right divide no matter what the facts may be?
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/16/business/what-sweden-can-tell-us-about-obamacare.html?_r=0The current administration is doing everything it can to make us just like Europe. If that happens, we're all screwed.
I hear some US people saying similar things. Perhaps they would change their views if they got to see more of the world?
-h